The Lucky Fishing Hat is the best helm you can get for your level 19 twink, no matter what class you play. With a whopping +15 Stamina, it’s almost double the health bonus of the Green Tinted Goggles, and casters should use it over Shadow Goggles. 150 Health vs +5 Int/+6 Spirit? No contest for PvP.

The Lucky Fishing Hat can only be obtained by fishing in the Stranglethorn Fishing Extravaganza and catching a rare fish, Keefer’s Angelfish, from one of the pools of Tastyfish that spawn all over the zone for the duration of the contest. You turn in the fish to the Fishbot 5000 in Booty Bay and it gives you the hat. You aren’t in the competition to win, just to catch a rare fish. Sounds easy, right?

Well, it is, if you prepare for it.

You will need to be able to fish in STV, so train your Fishing to 125 -150. While you should be able to fish from pools with Fishing 1, you’re better off fishing efficiently and not wasting casts on junk.

The safest way to level up your fishing is at the Dalaran fountain. You can get to 100+ pretty quickly there. Check with Marcia Chase periodically and grab a Strong Fishing Pole if she has one in stock, it gives you a bonus to your Fishing skill.

While the pools spawn all over STV, the mobs there will eat you alive if you don’t have protection. There’s only one place you can fish without being molested: Yojamba island off the northwest coast (at 15,16), home of the Zandalar tribe of trolls. These trolls are neutral and will not attack you.

Get your twink into position the night before the contest. The easiest way for Alliance to get to Yojamba island is to go to Westfall and swim south from Longshore. Horde can take the boat from Ratchet to Booty Bay, or the zeppelin from Orgrimmar to Grom’gol, and then swim north.

Setting your hearthstone in Booty Bay makes it easier to turn the fish in when you catch it, but is hardly necessary. The contest runs from 2-4 pm Sunday afternoon (server time), but you can turn your catches in to the Fishbot 5000 until 5pm. So you can swim south to Booty Bay in plenty of time.

Practice makes perfect.

I’ll admit, I was nervous about my first STV fishing tournament. In hindsight, it was really pretty easy.

I logged in around 2:30, right around the time that the winner was announced. The zone emptied out at that point, and I had no competition on the island. I have no doubts that the island could be crowded with other twinks, and on a PvP server that could get exciting. But I had the island to myself each time I fished there.

The pools spawn around the island and up the coast towards ZG. There are crocodiles up and down the coast that can be troublesome for some of the pools, but I found that parking my DK nearby allowed me to switch to him, clear out the mobs, and then go back to my warrior to fish.

You’re fishing from a limited set of pools around the island. Sometimes I’d be running laps waiting for one to respawn. A better strategy was to hop over to my main and fish out some other pools I couldn’t get to with my twink, then come back for the respawns.

It took me about 3 hours fishing total to get my hat, over two separate days. The drop rate is low, so you may have to fish a lot more than that to get it. Or you might get it right away! Random chance is random.

Finally, a fashionable hat for the jungle!

I’m glad I went ahead and upgraded my Green Tinted Goggles. It’s a little strange looking at Cynderblock’s eyes again, but for both tanking and PvP the hat really is awesome. My only complaint is that it gives her hat hair in the back – her long spinny braid has been tucked up neatly into the hat.

One side effect I hadn’t considered is that getting the Lucky Fishing Hat obsoletes your Engineering. Twinks get Engineering because it’s the easiest way to get a good helm; the bombs are an extra bonus! But with the LFH, you no longer need it as a profession and you have to evaluate your options all over again. Should you go with Herbalism’s powerful HoT, Mining’s stamina boost, or the crit bonus from Skinning? Or should you keep it around for the bombs?

Given how big a fan I am of Engineering in game, I’m really loath to drop it for something else. But the benefits of other professions do outweigh the benefits of bombs, no matter how much fun they are to throw.